Phone Call Focus In Pre-trial Hearing

Man Charged In Attempted Shooting Of Area Psychologist

MIDDLETOWN — After he was arrested in connection with the attempted shooting of a prominent area psychologist, Robbie Santos called his aunt to tell her he was in jail.

``I'm hit, Auntie,'' Santos said. ``Auntie, they given me attempted murder. ... I'm about to do a lot of time.''

Just what Santos meant by the words ``I'm hit'' became the focus of a pre-trial hearing Wednesday in Superior Court where Santos faces charges of attempted murder in the May 21, 2003, shooting that involved psychologist Derek Hopson.

A state correction officer who monitored Santos' telephone call to his aunt testified that the term was slang often heard in inmates' phone conversations.

``It means someone is caught doing something that they didn't want to be caught doing,'' the officer, James Pollard, said in response to questions from Assistant State's Attorney Russell C. Zentner.

Pollard said that in addition to hearing the words during his four years of recording calls placed by prison inmates, he has also heard it used by friends of his teenage daughter.

But when asked specifically by Santos' defense attorney, Brian S. Carlow, whether the words ``I'm hit'' translate into a confession, Pollard wasn't so clear. He admitted he didn't know exactly what Santos meant by the term.

``I can't testify as to what Mr. Santos was thinking,'' Pollard said.

Pollard's testimony was part of Wednesday's hearing on a motion by Carlow to block as evidence the use of telephone conversations Santos had from the jail. The hearing resumes today. Jury selection in the case began Tuesday but has been interrupted as Judge Robert L. Holzberg holds the pre-trial hearings on a series of motions in the case.

Hopson, 52, is the stepfather of basketball star Ray Allen and the author of several books about relationships and child rearing. Hopson and his former wife, with whom he wrote the books, ran the former Hopson Center for Psychological and Education Services in Middlefield. The couple divorced in October 2001.

Prosecutors say Santos approached Hopson in the parking lot of Middlesex Hospital's mental health clinic on South Main Street and asked for change. When Hopson refused and ducked into his car, Santos allegedly raised a .25-caliber handgun and fired at close range through the driver's side window, police said. The bullet missed Hopson.

In other testimony Wednesday, Christine Brown, a clinic secretary who witnessed the shooting, testified that Hopson had been beaten up six or seven months before the May 2003 shooting.

Prosecution motions claim Santos, a seven-time convicted felon, was offered $8,000 by an ``unknown person to pop [shoot to kill]'' Hopson. Santos reportedly talked about the botched shooting with family, inmates and corrections officers. However, Santos has maintained he had nothing to do with the shooting.

Santos, 32, is charged with conspiracy to commit murder, criminal attempt to commit murder and criminal attempt to commit first-degree assault, along with weapons-related charges.